In modern agriculture most products are subjected to a great deal of mechanical processing before reaching the market place. For example, a product might be mechanically harvested, graded, and several times stored and then transferred to a transport system. During this processing a significant proportion of produce is damaged to such an extent that it is not of merchantable quality when it reaches the market place. There is therefore continual interest in improving machinery to reduce the stresses applied. However there is also an interest in increasing the speed of operation of the machinery, and the two interests are inherently contradictory.
One of the problems in reducing the damage caused by machinery is identifying what stresses actually cause damage--for example impact stresses between two products, impact stresses between product and machinery, or shear stresses--and where these occur. In attempts to identify the nature and location of stresses occurring during mechanical processing of products mock products (herewith referred to as packages) have been fabricated and subjected to the processes. Each package has been designed to have physical characteristics such as shape similar to those of the associated product, has contained either a pressure transducer or an accelerometer and either means for radio-telemetering or means for storing information for analysis.
Many packages have been developed and reports of their sucessful testing published. However there has been a scarcity of publications disclosing useful results. It appears, therefore, either that the signals provided by the transducers or accelerometers used do not correlate with damage found on the product or that analysis of the telemetered or stored signals has proved impossible.